MV Norderney was from November, 1964 until 31 August 1974 the transmission ship for offshore radio station Radio Veronica.[1]
History
Norderney was built in 1949 as the MV HH 294 Paul J Müller in Hamburg-Finkenwerder. This 50 metre long trawler was in service as fishing-vessel in the waters around Iceland from 1950 until 1956 and in July of that year it was sold to the Niedersächsische Hochseefischerei GmbH. (Lower Saxony deepsea fishing Ltd.) and was re-christened as NC 420 Norderney.
In 1960, the then 11-year-old vessel was sold to a Dutch company for scrapping. In early 1964 the brothers Verweij bought the ship. The 3 brothers formed the management of Radio Veronica. Norderney was bought to replace the former German lightvessel Borkum Riff from 1911 as that vessel was completely worn-out and also a little bit too small to continue to be operated as a radio ship. As a (former) light-vessel Borkum Riff had her name printed in large letters on the hull of the ship: this idea was copied on Norderney, even though she wasn't a light-ship.
On the Zaanlandse Scheepsbouw Maatschappij shipyard in Zaandam the trawler was transformed into an offshore radio-ship. The works included placement of two 25 meter high wooden antenna-masts to connect the washing-line antenna (nickname for the